Nokia not Apple set the mobile phone industry back 10 years by not shipping a mass market phone until the N8 with enough RAM to multi-task ShoZu and other apps and to take full advantage of the great technical features of Symbian.

Prior to the N8 no mass market Nokias had enough RAM to run ShoZu in the background continously and upload dozens of photos per day. I know because I had an N95-1 (the N95 8GB had enough RAM but it didn't ship at iPhone scale), N82 and many other N series phones and only the N8 has enough RAM to multi-task. ShoZu on the N95-1 and N82 regularly crashed (I worked around the problem by rebooting the phone every day something I don't have to do with my N8 or iPhone 4) and it crashed even more if I tried to run other apps simultaneously. Perhaps that was a ShoZu error but wouldn't have been awesome if Nokia had bought and bundled and made ShoZu bulletproof ? Much better than iCloud's rigid photo syncing solution!

Boy oh boy I loved ShoZu (I uploaded over 44000 photos using ShoZu) and used it until I got the N8. ShoZu doesn't work on the N8 :-( so I now use PixelPipe (which barely works because the developers have pivoted and the program is starting to bit rot and just barely works i.e. functionality that used to work no longer works: e.g. you can't enter tags from a list, you have to manually enter tags, you can't change which flickr account you are uploading to, etc)

Take yourself back to the days of the Nokia N95 8GB. It was a terrific handset: An excellent camera, super form factor, nice keypad — a true ‘Multimedia computer’.

Perhaps the best thing about those Symbian devices was that they could multitask properly. Hardcore Symbian developers could access almost every inch of the operating system’s plumbing to bring phenomenally useful services to users.

My most frequently used function on my Nokia Symbian devices was ShoZu. I wouldn’t shut up about it. This was (and still is!) a service that ran in the background on-demand. ShoZu would get your images off your Nokia really quickly. Many of my mobile friends had ShoZu doing an automatic upload. Snap a photo and boom, you’d see the little data indicator briefly switch on and off as the service sent your photo up to the ShoZu servers and then on to whatever services you’d configured (Flickr being a popular one). I opted for a little bit more control — so whenever I took a photo, ShoZu would immediately ask if I wanted the photo sent up to the internet. Again, if you pressed ‘yes’, that was it. Job done. Everything happened in the background.

You could get on with your day. I loved it.

Back at this point — 2005/2006, the mobile industry was looking incredibly exciting.

Nokia is behind Apple in overall cameraphone user experience and that's what matters! Sure Nokia is still king when it comes to technology as Damian pointed out (f2.2 on N9, 12 megapixels on N8, Xenon flash on N8, the size of the sensor and microphone technology) but in terms of overall cameraphone experience, I believe with the iPhone4S, Apple has passed Nokia.

It doesn't matter how great the cameraphone technology is if the overall cameraphone user experience isn't great!

Overall cameraphone user experience = great image quality + great cameraphone apps that take advantage of that image quality like Slow Shutter, Camera+, Pro Camera and a dozens of other great iPhone-only cameraphone apps that don't exist on Nokia cameraphones at the moment; Nokia is now severely lacking in great cameraphone apps and falling behind in video cameraphone technology. That's the lesson of Steve Jobs and Apple I think, great user experience trumps the technology no matter how great the technology underneath.

And nothing lasts forever; I believe Apple could be dethroned in overall cameraphone leadership and I believe you, Damian :-) and your team's great cameraphone technology combined with Windows Phone 7 Metro UI or a post Meego user experience and developers that develop great cameraphone apps on top of this great user experience could dethrone Apple. I'm rooting for you and for an ecosystem of great cameraphone apps to develop in the future for Nokia; after all Apple cameraphone users can't have all the awesome cameraphone app experience forever to themselves :-) ! Competition will re-assert itself :-)

With the iPhone4S, Apple is now the leader in cameraphones. The only advantage left to Nokia is the Zeiss lens. They have fallen behind in everything else! Sad but true! I hope Damian Dinning and his fab team at Nokia have an even better Nokia cameraphone waiting to be introduced before the end of the year. Fingers crossed!

The iPhone4S has a camera processing chip, the so-called image signal processor aka "ISP" and it has over 6000 cameraphone apps and a f2.4 lens and HD video. The N8 and the N9 lose in all areas except when it comes to raw megapixel count (the N8 has 12 megapixels) and perhaps in the lens quality: the N9 has 8MP and f2.2; the N8 has 82MP and f2.8; both are Zeiss optics which are better lens (methinks) than the iPhone4S 5 element "no-name" design.

Time will tell if Nokia can regain its cameraphone crown but back in 2007 (the time of the "laughable" iPhone 2G; I didn't laugh; I had an iPhone 2G as well as my Nokia N95 and N82 which combined I used to take tens of thousands of photos and I loved the original iPhone web browser and knew back then the iPhone wouidn't be a toy cameraphone in 2011) nobody in the land of Nokia watchers and enthusiasts would have thought that that Apple would produce the iPhone4S that overall beats Nokia cameraphones and not only that will ship in volumes that dwarf the N95 and N82 sales: Every single deficiency that the original iPhone had compared to Nokia cameraphones in 2007 has been corrected and surpassed by the iPhone4S in 2011

And doesn't understand why the UI is not as responsive in general e.g when playing Angry Birds on the N8
or why the N8 Angry Birds sometimes displays black blotches instead of the correct graphics.

Ah the current sad state of computer software, hardware and experience where only a few companies like Apple can make a compelling, complete experience. (i.e. beyond the Fisher Price iPhone experience; I love Fisher Price Ewan, I also love computer power tools like Ubuntu and Emacs) . I am looking forward to trying out Android in depth but it feels like Linux before Ubuntu rather than a compelling experience that can compete with Apple's.

It's time for real total mobile experience innovation. One that isn't tethered to a PC. One that helps me manage my life without drowning in a sea of overlapping and confusing apps or "ad driven where my data is sold to the highest bidder" web apps.

Perhaps I'll just give in to my geeky nature and run my own powerful but hard to use server for services for my mobile like I run this blog on my own server.

Dave Winer has been writing for many years about a social camera. I have been writing for years about how ShoZu + Nokia Cameraphones are killer apps and built-in ShoZu would be a killer app (e.g. Nokia should buy ShoZu).

My current thinking is:

Canon or Nikon's sensors and lens + Nokia phone with "comes with world wide connectivity and built-in easy to use app for uploading photos and HD video to all popular social sites e.g. flickr, facebook, picasa" + sideload to your Computer and OVI files (i.e. Eye-fi done right, not as an aftermarket kludge - don't get me wrong, unlike Dave I love my Eye-Fi card; it's done well but at the end of the day it's a hack!) for backup in real time using ShoZu-like technology to do it in the background and auto-resume if connectivity lost =

an awesome social camera that would sell well

The current Nokia solution is Share Online which is:

a) hard to use

b) hard to configure

c) doesn't work in the background and auto-resume like ShoZu

d) requires folks to figure out the whole "3G/WiFi don't automatically switch to 3G when I am roaming" dance

As Dave points out if Nokia doesn't do it (and Nokia is the only company with all the pieces including camera hardware and software, ShoZu-like tech, etc) and the biz dev clout to do something like a "Comes with bandwidth" partnership like Amazon did for the Kindle), somebody else will do it e.g. Apple or Google or some social camera upstart.

I actually want something like the MacBook Air. (which I was wrong about since it was introduced at MacWorld). The current MacBook Air is awesome for frequent travelers who have another more powerful Mac that they can use for CPU intensive tasks when they are not on the road. I am not a frequent traveller so I don't need the current MacBook Air.

What I would like is something that is light and thin that I can carry anywhere and that will allow me to quickly dock with other displays wirelessly (I like having multiple monitors when at the office and home but even I get tired of connecting and disconnecting DVI cables!) and to delegate CPU computing intensive tasks to another Mac on the fly over a really fast network like 4G or WiMax or 802.11n (automatically picking the right one like the iPhone does today with EDGE and 802.11b/g). Basically the MacBookAir plus a "CPU task auto delegation" facility built into the OS as well as seamless wireless monitor connections. Oh and always on i.e. the $USD 3000 Flash option. I am sure this is coming. Just have to be patient.

Apple tablet is coming if not today, soon since the iPhone (bonus relevant analysis: before iPhone and after iPhone) is just a wee tablet that has call processing (to use a Nortel/Bellhead-ism and to all the doubters Apple has done everything that the iPhone does before except call processing which is not trivial and GSM/EDGE/3G which I have to concede is even less trivial). Looking forward to the next installment of the Apple soap opera ... er keynote :-) in 1.5 hours!

Update: I found a link to a "leaked" outline for the WWDC keynote tomorrow -- talking about a 10" iPhone at Home...which is pretty close to the "tablet / non computer" that I've been thinking Apple would launch for quite some time.

Please read the very thoughtful N800 review that I've quoted below. I can live without YouTube, really (and I am sure this will be fixed!). Easy to make video and audio calls with SIP and soon Skype + open Linux make this the closest thing today to Doc's ophone (anything with a SIM in it will never be truly open!) concept. I definitely want one of these things! Saving my pennies! When Skype comes out for it, I'll be seriously tempted to cross over the border into the USA and pick one up! Go Nokia go!

[BTW still want the N95, N999 and the iPhone :-) Yes I am obsessed or rather I have a compulsive need to create and consume stuff on the go and N95, N999, N800 and the iPhone are (or will be) the best ways to do this!]

Take it from me, see-me calls are just … natural. When you don’t have to decide up-front, “I want to pay extra for this, so it better be worth using,” there’s an immediate acceptance of “this is the way it’s meant to be.” And it’s the kind of thing that makes people buy a new device, the way Visicalc (the first spreadsheet) made buying one of those new-fangled Apples worthwhile 20-plus years ago. The step-in price is reasonable, the experience is unique and persuasive immediately, and you don’t worry that “this is going to cost and cost and cost.”

You won’t hear this described as “video conferencing” or “video calls” next year, btw. Those names are so Flash Gordon in their invocation of the future. So don’t trust that any reviewer who uses one of those terms has any idea of what’s coming. Video conferences are what the guy holding a Treo expects to happen, once Verizon offers it as part of a $120-a-month data plan.

Some users wonder about why the N800 jettisons the useful screen cover that the 770 comes with. It’s so you’re always able to get a call. Putting on the 770’s cover doesn’t turn off the WiFi (or Bluetooth), but it breaks the wireless connection. Users make it a physical representation of “I’m putting my device to sleep.” You don’t put your phone to sleep, and the N800 behaves similarly.

And it makes a world of difference between these tablets and laptops that really do sleep. Your tablet is just on. You start using it. No delay, no wakeup, no nothing. I’ve always regarded the 770 as “instant on” because it’s live the moment the screen cover comes down. But the “never off” side of the N800 is better, and I’m more comfortable with keeping it on all day and connected to my network than I have been with the 770.

It’s my contention that the opportunity to hook up with voip giant Skype got tied to the webcam, and Ari Virtanen’s ascension to the VP of convergent products not only put the internet tablet into the mainstream of Nokia’s future thinking (and N-series)**, but also into the CES and consumer electronic marketing timeframes. They weren’t going to launch entry number two on some random day in spring like entry one (May 25, to be precise).

I want both an iPhone and the N999. The 1.0 iPhone ain't a blogaphone unless it has a video camera and Shozu-like tech built in (or you can add it which you can't in 1.0) but other than that it's pretty darned close. Until then I will also carry the closest N999 equivalent which will probably be an an N95 (which I got to examine yesterday thanks to the Comvu folks and the screen is fab and it feels light and nice in the hand!).

Thank-goodness for Apple! Now we wil get some innovation in the mobile space. Series 60 and Symbian OS really need some re-thinking in terms of usability and needs to get more stable. Even with just the built-in software, I regularly have to reboot my N93 and the other Series 60 Symbian devices I get for free trial from Nokia Blogger Relations; this is unacceptable!

Adobe Lightroom Beta 1 is a a fantastic beta (and a fun introduction to easy to use RAW processing for RAW "virgins" :-) like myself) but I have stopped using it for now for the following reasons:

If you rename the RAW file and import into Lightroom, it uses the old name (reads it from the EXIF perhaps?).

The light table is not adequate. There is no way to see the original file and your changed file at the same time. Supposedly, pressing control while hovering over the photo should show the original but that doesn't work for me on my 15" Aluminum Powerbook with 1GB RAM and Mac OS X 10.4.4.

It has great promise. I am relieved that their will be competition for Aperture and I look forward to trying the next beta!

Wow! Well done! I am glad to see Aperture actually has some competition! Vive la difference!:

QUOTE

Adobe® Lightroom™ Beta is the efficient new way for professional photographers to import, select, develop, and showcase large volumes of digital images. So you can spend less time sorting and refining photographs, and more time actually shooting them. Its clean, elegant interface literally steps out of the way and lets you quickly view and work with the images you shot today, as well as the thousands of images that you will shoot over the course of your career. Because no two photographers work alike, Adobe Lightroom adapts to your workflow, not the other way around.

Prediction number 2: Apple will not introduce an iPod with built in recording (and leave it to 3rd party manufacturers which is OK but it would great for podcasters if they had an iPod for podcasters) nor will they introduce anything to record video (on a phone or otherwise). This is one prediction I hope will not come true because I think there is a market for a iPod for podcasters and Apple has the ability to make it a truly easy to use, seamless experience from microphone back to the iPod.

RSS is the real convergence medium; it's already the transport for multi-media on the web. If you want your audio, video or whatever to get circulated and noticed, the best way to to do this is to put a link to it in an RSS feed with enclosures!

Thanks to Dave Winer for inventing the enclosure tag, Adam Curry for solving the last mile problem (automating the transfer to the iPod) and to the bloggers who who popularized RSS. Oh and I guess I should thank Apple for making podcasting mainstream. I don't like Apple's proprietary in origin RSS extensions for iTunes and Apple's lack of community involvement around those extensions (just like I don't like similar actions from M*crosoft) but on the whole I think Apple's done more good than bad here since I doubt late adopters like Anasi or New Media BC would be podcasting and videoblogging without Apple pushing podcasting. (And of course there's nothing wrong with being a late adopter! Go New Media BC go! Go Anasi go!)